If you’re chronically online like me, you may have come across the peculiar renderings for a nine-hole domed golf course about an hour outside of Chicago.
Yes, we’re talking about an actual indoor golf course.
All of us are familiar with the endless (and growing) supply of simulators whether they are at an indoor simulator club like Five Iron or inside someone’s garage at home.
Through all of it, I never stopped to consider that indoor golf didn’t have to be limited to hitting into a screen.
Maybe indoor golf can be … actual golf?
Plans are in place for a full-scale indoor golf course
In what is being tabbed the world’s first full-scale indoor golf course, Megalodome Golf is planning a desert-themed nine-hole venue in Oswego, Ill. To call this Chicago would be generous—Oswego might as well be southern Wisconsin.
Megalodome says the project will cost $50 million, a number that stopped me in my tracks. Is that a typo? Given the renderings and the scale of the course, it feels like they might have forgotten to add a zero.
Four massive domes would cover the climate-controlled executive course (and a range) that would have the look and feel of Arizona.
The facility would operate 6 a.m. to midnight year-round. Rounds would take only about 90 minutes because it’s relatively short, meaning a full 18 is around three hours.
This is going to be on artificial turf but it would also include real sand and water.
The height of the dome? About 110 feet. Hmm … they might want to add to this.
The Megalodome indoor course is still in the investment phase and doesn’t plan to open until late 2027. We know how these ventures aren’t exactly sure things so I wouldn’t assume this is a slam dunk.
It’s entirely possible (and some would even say likely) the company switches gears or changes the scale at some point.
Is this a great idea or a terrible one?
Let’s just assume this gets built. And let’s assume it’s functional.
Those are gargantuan assumptions but hear me out.
I kind of feel like this could slap.
Chicagoland is freezing cold for six months of the year. The other six months are warmer but there will still be rain, heat and other reasons to want to be indoors.
Then you have the ability to play for 18 hours of the day while only needing 90 minutes to get through nine holes.
As much as I love getting on a simulator, there is nothing like seeing the ball fly through the air.
Even on an artificial turf executive course.
Now, I highly doubt this particular project comes to fruition in the way the renderings show.
However, if someone could pull this type of thing off, I think it would be packed. There are enough golf-crazed maniacs within driving distance who would want to check it out.
What are your thoughts on this? Let me know below in the comments.
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